Video Senshi Laserion

Video Soldier Laserion (ビデオ戦士レザリオン, Bideo Senshi Rezarion) was one of the first anime series to feature virtual reality.

The story is centered around middle-school student Takashi Katori and his classmate/best friend/love interest, Olivia Lawrence. Takashi, who began as a mere online game fan, developed a small virtual world with his friend David from New York, in which they played their robot combat game. They would play by sending data to each other using satellite technology. One day while they were playing, a scientific experiment using the same satellite was being conducted involving teleporting an American plane from New York to Japan. In a freak accident caused by an explosion during a rebellion by people of the moon who attacked Earth, the plane that was converted into digital information was sent to the virtual world while Takashi's robot information was rematerialized into a real robot.

Takashi was arrested, but later the Earth Confederation Government discovered that Dr. Godheid, an evil, broken-hearted genius scientist from the Moon (now a sort of abandoned colony with restricted access) was behind the revolt. The government forces Takashi to pilot the virtual robot Laserion and protect the Earth alongside robot pilots Sahara & Charles and their G1 & G2 robots.

Soon, however, the aliens of the Jack Empire appear and replace Godheid's Rebel Army, taking his former lieutenant Inspire as well as Olivia's father Steve Lawrence as minions and imprisoning everyone else on the Moon base. Gario, a young warrior in the Jack ranks, is chosen as the champion of their army and given to pilot the new robot Gario Savang - a formidable mecha that only Laserion can rival. At the same time, under pretext of a reunion, Steve kidnaps his own daughter for the Jacks, separating her from Takashi. With the aid of an alien defector named Elefan - whose UFO Takashi had once taken down, making him lose his memory and gradually being brought back to functioning cognizance by Olivia through a series of drawings, and who becomes the pilot of the new G5 robot - Takashi's war against the Jacks takes on a personal level, and he must lead the Earth Confederation forces to free Olivia and her father, defeat Gario and get rid of the Jack Empire once and for all.

Tropes used in Video Senshi Laserion include:

• Alien Invasion: The Jack Empire. Their skin is purple, similar to the Derringer Civilization from Lightspeed God Albegas (from a year earlier, also by Toei).
• Always Someone Better: Dr. Godheid after turning on Dr. Blueheim, his mentor, is exiled to the Moon but summons all the outlaws living there that eventually form the Rebel Army.
• Break the Cutie: The plot seems to take delight on trying to break poor Olivia's soul.
• Deal with the Devil: The Rebel Army allying with the more powerful Jack Empire.
• Gone Horribly Wrong: Dr. Blueheim's teleporting device and facility was supposed to teleport a physical passenger jet from New York to Tokyo. However, because of the Rebel Army attacking and damaging the transmitter, Takashi's robot code is crossed up in the data and the jet is sent in virtual form to David's computer, while the robot materializes in the teleporting device.
• Hero's Muse: Olivia. When Laserion is being beaten up and losing the fight, Takashi Katori thinks of her to summon the will to keep on fighting and turn the tables on the bad guys. She's a combination of Girl Next Door and Foreign People Are Sexy (she was one of the few white Americans to become a Love Interest to a main Japanese character of the era).
• Humongous Mecha: Aside from the title character and the Black Bear enemies, the G1, G2 and G5 robots who help Laserion. Gario's Gario-Savang robot and the many similar Red Bear robots made by the Jack Empire later enter the fray as well.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: Takashi initially hesitates to work for the Federation government and says that he hates war and that he's only a kid. He changes his mind when David reminds him that, by defeating the Rebel Army's Black Bear robots, Takashi's painted a target on his and Laserion's back.
• Improbable Age: Takashi, who is a middle school student, codes an entire robot down to the movement of its pinky finger. When the robot is brought to life by the teleporter, it retains virtual-reality aspects, such as teleportation and conjuring weapons out of thin air.
• Insecure Love Interest: Olivia worries that Takashi cannot find the time to pay attention to her, as busy as he is saving the world from enemy mecha.
• Kill It with Fire: The G robots kill the Jack leaders with a huge flame that burns them to skeletons in the end.
• Missing Mom: Olivia's. Her father Steve is also a Disappeared Dad but only because he is taken prisoner by the Rebel Army and then transferred to Jack control.
• Mooks: The fighter jets and some of the Black Bears, to Laserion. However, the G robots can dispose of the fighter jets but not the Bears if there are too many of them.
• Older Sidekick: Charles and Sahara become such to Takashi de-facto. Also Elefan, all of them by piloting the G robots, which are strong in battle but do not have Laserion's abilities.
• Playful Hacker: Takashi. Similar to David Lightman in War Games, he is arrested by The Government agency but then given a chance to solve the real-world problem.
• Reluctant Hero: Takashi. Also Olivia, in some way becomes his moral support and de-facto suffering wife, before becoming an effective Distressed Damsel.
• The Game Come to Life: Takashi's robot was originally made of computer code for the virtual world hosted by the network, but materializes into a real robot.
• The Professor: Dr. Blueheim.
• Token Black: Charles.
  • Sahara, who is an Arab from North Africa, also counts as a Token Minority.
  • Token Non-Human: Elefan. He has green skin, unlike the Jacks, and is thus considered good (he also despises them and that's why he's helping the Earthlings).
• United Nations Is a Super Power: The Earth Confederation (called a confederation, meaning the nations have equal membership, as opposed to a federation with a one world government. Since the original title is in Japanese (地球連邦軍 chikyū renpōgun), it may have been Lost in Translation). It is modeled on the real-life United Nations and is plausible due to the fact that the other celestial bodies settled by Earth humans (in the storyline) are the Moon and Mars. It also accounts for the varied ethnicities involved in the storyline.
• Wholesome Crossdresser: Takashi dresses up in Olivia's clothes and a wig to get out of his apartment to meet David, who has flown all the way from New York to Tokyo to meet him (David does not realize that Laserion turned into a real robot until Takashi-as-Olivia tells him). The two boys go on a "date" to pretend that the two foreign characters are dating each other, but both the Rebel Army agents tailing them as well as Sahara (who has also been tailing them) realize that it's Takashi, who does not realize that handling Laserion's virtual secret weakness could be beneficial to either side in the real conflict.